Barbarians

In memory of my grandfathers, Frederick Fernquist and Donald Lupton
THE AUTHOR AND PUBLISHER SPECIALLY WISH TO THANK O REN FALK,

ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF HISTORY AT C ORNELL U NIVERSITY,
FOR HIS INVALUABLE HELP IN REVIEWING THE MANUSCRIPT OF THIS BOOK .
Marshall Cavendish Benchmark 99 White Plains Road Tarrytown, New York 10591
www.marshallcavendish.us
Text copyright 2010 by Marshall Cavendish Corporation Map copyright 2010 by Mike Reagan
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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Hinds, Kathryn, 1962Vikings / by Kathryn Hinds.
p. cm. (Barbarians!)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Summary: A history of the Viking Age, from about 793 to 1066Provided by publisher.
ISBN 978-0-7614-4521-0
1. VikingsJuvenile literature. 2. NorthmenJuvenile literature. 3. Vikings. 4. Northmen.
I. Title. DL65.H565 2010 948.022dc22 2008039052
EDITOR: Joyce Stanton PUBLISHER: Michelle Bisson ART DIRECTOR: Anahid Hamparian
SERIES DESIGNER: Michael Nelson
Images provided by Rose Corbett Gordon, Art Editor of Mystic CT, from the following sources: Cover: The
Granger Collection, NY Back cover: Gianni Dagli Orti/Corbis Page 1: British Museum/Art Resource, NY; pages
2-3: Christopher Wood Gallery, London/Bridgeman Art Library; page 6: Arni Magnusson Institute, Reykjavik,
Iceland/Bridgeman Art Library; page 8: Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington/Bridgeman Art Library; page 10:
British Library/HIP/Art Resource, NY; pages 11, 16, 38, 39: Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library; page 15:
Nationalmuseum, Stockholm/Bridgeman Art Library; page 17: The Granger Collection, NY; page 18: Erich
Lessing/Art Resource, NY; pages 19, 71: The Art Archive/Historiska Muset Stockholm/Gianni Dagli Orti; pages
21, 26, 40: Mary Evans Picture Library/Edwin Wallace/The Image Works; page 22: Dave G. Houser/Corbis;
page 24: The Pierpont Morgan Library/Art Resource, NY; page 27: Stefano Bianchetti/Corbis; page 29: Royal
Library, Copenhagen/Bridgeman Art Library; page 30: Houses of Parliament, Westminster, London/Bridgeman Art Library; pages 32, 56: Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library; page 33: The Art Archive/Bibliothque des Arts Dcoratifs Paris/Gianni Dagli Orti; page 34: Scala/Art Resource, NY; pages 37, 64, 65: Werner
Forman/Corbis; page 41: Ted Spiegel/Corbis; page 43: National Museums of Scotland/Bridgeman Art Library;
page 44: Greg Probst/Corbis; page 45: Tim Thompson/Corbis; page 46: Nasjonalgalleriet, Oslo/Bridgeman Art
Library; page 47: PoodlesRock/Corbis; pages 48, 50, 62, Mary Evans Picture Library/The Image Works; page
51: Archives Charmet/Bridgeman Art Library; page 52: Bettmann/Corbis; page 54: Werner Forman
Archive/Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid/The Image Works; page 58: State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg/Bridgeman Art Library; page 60: Werner Forman/Topham/The Image Works; page 63: The Art Archive/British Library;
pages 68, 69: The Art Archive/Muse de la Tapisserie Bayeux/Gianni Dagli Orti.
Printed in Malaysia
135642
cover: The First Cargo, painted in 1910 by N. C. Wyeth to illustrate a story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
half-title page: A seventh-century helmet found in a royal grave in England. It was probably either made
in Scandinavia or inspired by Scandinavian armor.
title page: A dramatic though fanciful painting of a Viking fleet by an early twentieth-century English artist
back cover: An eleventh-century English ship built in the Viking style, portrayed in the Bayeux Tapestry
who were the barbarians?
Introducing the Vikings
Fighting for Loot and Land
23
Exploring in the West
35
Trading and Raiding in the East
49
The End of an Era
61
key dates in viking history
70
glossary
72
for more information
74
selected bibliography
75
sources for quotations
76
index
78
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
THE WORD BARBARIAN WAS COINED BY THE ANCIENT GREEKS

and picked up by the Romans, imitating the sounds of languages they found incomprehensible. Soon, though, barbarians came to be thought of not just as peoples unfamiliar with
the languages and customs of Greece and Rome, but as wild,
uncivilized, uncultured peoples. This stereotype has largely
endured to the present day, and the barbarian label has been
applied to a variety of peoples from many parts of Europe and
Asia. For example, to the medieval European farmers and town
dwellers who inherited Roman civilization, no one could have
been more barbaric than the Vikings.
above: Egil Skallagrimsson, tenth-century Viking poet
The barbarians, of course, did not think of themselves this

way. They had rich cultures of their own, as even some ancient
writers realized. Great Greek and Roman historians such as
Herodotus and Tacitus investigated and described their customs, sometimes even holding them up as examples for the
people of their own sophisticated societies. Moreover, the relationships between the barbarians and civilization were varied
and complex. Barbarians are most famous for raiding and
invading, and these were certainly among their activities. But
often the barbarians were peaceable neighbors and close allies,
trading with the more settled peoples and even serving them
as soldiers and contributing to their societies in other ways.
Our information about the barbarians comes from a variety of sources: archaeology, language studies, ancient and
medieval historians, and later literature. Unfortunately, though,
we generally have few records in the barbarians own words,
since many of these peoples did not leave much written material. Instead we frequently learn about them from the writings
of civilizations who thought of them as strange and usually
inferior, and often as enemies. But modern scholars, like detectives, have been sifting through the evidence to learn more and
more about these peoples and the compelling roles they have
played in the history of Europe, Asia, and even Africa. Now its
our turn to look beyond the borders of the familiar great civilizations of the past and meet the barbarians.
FF THE COAST OF THE MEDIEVAL ENGLISH KINGDOM OF

Northumbria lay Lindisfarne. This island was home to one of the
most influential monasteries in Christian Europe. Here monks produced beautiful books: copies of the Bible and lives of the saints and
works of great learning on many subjects. Here, too, was the tomb of
Saint Cuthbert, a renowned holy man. Generations of Northumbrian
kings were also buried at Lindisfarne, which they had honored as their
special church. Both from royal gifts and large landholdings (on the
mainland as well as the island), the monastery enjoyed great wealth.
The monks worshipped at altars adorned with precious metalwork,
pursuing their prayers in peace and plenty.
Then, in 793, as recorded in an early English history called the
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle,
Dire portents appeared over Northumbria and sorely frightened
the people. They consisted of immense whirlwinds and flashes
9
Opposite page:
Immense whirlwinds and
flashes of lightning were
among the dire
signs said
to foretell the
arrival of the
Vikings at
Lindisfarne.
of lightning, and fiery dragons were

seen flying through the air. A great
famine immediately followed those
signs, and a little after that in the
same year, on 8 June, the ravages of
heathen men miserably destroyed
Gods church on Lindisfarne, with
plunder and slaughter.
A page from
the Lindisfarne
Gospels, one of the
precious books
produced by the
monks of Lindisfarne before the
monastery was
raided by Vikings
Another early chronicle identified the

raiders and elaborated on their actions: The
pagans from the northern region came with
a naval armament to Britain, like stinging
hornets, and overran the country in all directions, like fierce wolves, plundering, tearing,
and killing not only sheep and oxen, but
priests . . . and choirs of monks and nuns.
The fact that the raiders were not Christians, targeted a holy place,
and harmed people dedicated to religion made the attack especially
shocking. Moreover, no one had dreamed that the island monastery
could be vulnerable to such an assault. The Northumbrian scholar
Alcuin, writing shortly after the event, summed up its impact: Never
before has such terror appeared in Britain as we have now suffered
from a pagan race; nor was it thought that such an inroad from the sea
could be made. But making inroads from the sea was something at
which these northern people, whom we know as the Vikings, excelled.
THE LANDS OF THE NORTH
The Vikings, also known as the Norse or Northmen, came from what
are now Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, nations that only took shape
later during the medieval period. They are located in the northern
[ 10 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
European region known as Scandinavia, which occupies two peninsulas and hundreds of islands. One peninsula, Jutland, sticks up like a
thumb from what is now Germany and commands the passage from
the North Sea to the Baltic Sea. Jutlands land is flat and rich-soiled.
During the time of the Vikings, much of it was covered by forests of
deciduous trees such as oak, and there were many bogs and marshes.
The Scandinavian Peninsula (from which the whole region takes its
name) hangs down from the north, dividing the Baltic from the North
Atlantic. The terrain ranges from fertile lowlands in the southeast to
rugged mountains in the west, where the Norwegian coast is indented
with hundreds of fjords. Deciduous trees grow in the south, giving way
to mixed deciduous and evergreen forests and then to taiga, where only
cone-bearing evergreens grow, and finally to arctic tundra in the north.
Two major groups lived (and still live) in Scandinavia. One was the
Saami, who tended to be nomadic, following reindeer herds and
other animals that they depended on for their survival. During the
Middle Ages they inhabited a larger
region than they now occupy, which
is in the north of Norway, Sweden,
Finland, and Russia. Their language
was related to Hungarian and
Finnish; medieval Scandinavian
writers referred to them as Finns.
The people we typically think of as
Scandinavians spoke a language
related to English and German, Old
Norse. (This language was the direct
ancestor of modern Icelandic, Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish.) Their
lifestyle was a mainly settled one
based on farming.
[
introducing the vikings 00000000000000000000000 11 ]
A Saami woman
milks a reindeer.
The Saami have a
long tradition of
reindeer hunting
and herding.
GREENLAND
ICELAND
SNAEFELLSNES
REYKJANES
WESTERN SETTLEMENT
LANGANES
HORN
THINGVELLIR
FAEROES
MIDDLE SETTLEMENT
EASTERN SETTLEMENT
SHET
ORK
HEBRIDES
NORTH
ATLANTIC
MARKLAND?
IONA
IRELAND M
DUBLIN
LIMERICK
CORK
LANSE AUX MEADOWS
V IN
LAN
D?
BR
IB
LISBON
SEVILLE
CADIZ
THE WORLD
OF THE VIKINGS
MILES
200
STAD
SHETLANDS
ORKNEYS
DES
NORTH
SEA
SCOTLAND
IONA
DENMARK
YORK
D
AN
NOVGOROD
BULGAR
LONDON
HAMBURG
KIEV
DORESTAD
ER
FRANKIA
PARIS
GA
SEI
NE
BRITTANY
OL
NORMANDY
DN
EP
ROUEN
LO IRE
ROME
IBERIA
MED
NORTH AFRICA
IT
BAKU
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CRDOBA
CONSTANTINOPLE
ITALY
IA N S
BLACK SEA
PISA
SP
CA
CAMARGUE
RH NE
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SEVILLE
CADIZ
RUSSIA
GOTLAND
HEDEBY
ENGLAND FRISIA
CORK
STARAYA LADOGA
LINDISFARNE
JARROW
WALE
S
AND MAN
UBLIN
UPPSALA
BIRKA
OSEBERG
GOKSTAD
F IN L
NO
ROES
C SE A
BALTI
RW
SWE AY
DE
N
BYZANTINE
EMPIRE
ER
RA
N EAN SEA
PERSIA
BAGHDAD
Scholars have only recently begun to study interactions between

Saami and Norse-speaking Scandinavians at this period. There is good
evidence that the two peoples traded with one another. There are also
mentions of Saami paying tribute to Norse chiefs and traders who
used force and other means to exploit them. Some Scandinavians
became very wealthy thanks to these payments. As a ninth-century
Norwegian merchant named Ottar explained,
That tribute consists of the skins of the [reindeer] herds, the
feathers of birds, whalebone and ship rope made from walrus
hide and sealskin. Each pays according to his rank. The highest
in rank has to pay fifteen marten skins, five reindeer skins, one
bear skin, ten measures of feathers, and a jacket of bear skin or
otter skin, and two ship ropes . . . one made from walrus hide,
the other from seal.
Ottar took these valuable goods and sailed with them down the coast
of Norway, stopping to make sales at market centers along the way and
then in Denmark and England, too.
LIFE IN SCANDINAVIA
Farm families made up the majority of the population in the Middle

Ages. Norse farmers grew barley, rye, oats, peas, broad beans, cabbage,
and onions and other root vegetables. Where the land and climate were
right, they also raised flax (which provided both linen and nourishing
flaxseeds), hemp (which provided fiber for rope and other uses), hops
(which helped flavor beer), herbs, and dye plants such as woad (which
gave a blue dye). Only in the warmer, more fertile southern parts of
Scandinavia could farmers grow wheatnorth of Denmark, wheat
bread was usually a luxury.
On farms in very cold, rugged areas, livestock were the main focus,
[ 14 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
but they were important on all farms. Cattle were raised for meat, milk,
leather, and pulling carts and plows; sheep for wool, meat, milk, and
skins; goats for milk and meat; geese and chickens for eggs, feathers,
and meat; and horsesthe most valuable animalsfor pulling vehicles and riding. People sometimes ate horsemeat, too, which may have
been part of special religious rites. Pork was also eaten on special
occasions, but mostly by the upper class; pigs were not found on the
average farm.
Hunting and fishing were important parts of rural life, especially
where it was difficult to grow crops or hay for the winter feeding of livestock. And just as people could sell or trade their surplus farm products, they could sell or trade their surplus game, game products (such
as furs and reindeer antlers), and fish (which could be dried to be preserved and transported long distances). Scandinavians also hunted
whales, walruses, and seals, sometimes leaving home for lengthy periods to pursue these sea animals. In the north, seal and whale meat might
be mainstays of the diet. Seabirds, too, were hunted, and not just for
[
This Norwegian
landscape, with
mountains rising
up on either side
of a fjord, was
painted by a
Swedish artist in
the nineteenth
century. The scene
would have looked
much the same
during Viking
times.
Walrus were difficult to hunt but

also extremely
profitable, since
their tusks were
Europes main
source of ivory
a much-valued
materialduring
most of the
Middle Ages.
their meat: feathers and down were much valued for stuffing mattresses,
pillows, quilts, and even jackets. Falcons, which could be sold for great
profit, were also caught; they would be trained to help human hunters.
Norse farms were often small, and so were rural communities
commonly half a dozen families or fewer. Along with outlying pastureland, each family had its own fenced plot surrounding the house. The
family included not only parents and children but also, in many cases,
grandparents and unmarried aunts and uncles. In a prosperous household there might be a few servants or slaves, too.
A typical home was a longhouse, divided into two or three sections
inside; one section was for animals, at least in the winter. In addition
there were usually several outbuildings, which included workshops, hay
barns, and storehouses. Rural families were resourceful and independent, producing much of what they needed themselves. Women made
thread, cloth, clothing, bread, cheese, sausages, beer, and so on. Men
crafted such things as tools, hunting weapons, and fishing boats; farmers typically had considerable skill in carpentry and blacksmithing.
There were also specialized craftsmen, for example smiths who
made swords and armor, and others who worked in gold, silver, and
bronze to create jewelry and similar luxury items. Artisans like these
[ 16 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
often lived in towns and trading centers that were under the patronage of kings, nobles, or great landowners. As in other cultures, the
upper class made up the smallest segment of society. In eighth- and
ninth-century Scandinavia, though, it was not entirely necessary to be
born into this class. A man with a reputation for bravery, leadership,
and generosity could gain followers and influence. If he also gained sufficient wealth (which allowed him to acquire even more followers and
influence), he could become a powerful jarla chieftain or noble.
Occasionally, he might even become king.
LEAD-IN TO THE VIKING AGE
Before the modern era, mountains, dense forests, and marshes made
land travel in Scandinavia extremely time-consuming, difficult, and
sometimes impossible. Rivers, inlets, and other waterways, however,
were abundant, and people took full advantage of them from very early
times. They were all-season roadseven when they froze over in
winter, travelers could still use them, thanks to skis, skates, and sleds.
Most settlements were close to the coasts or to water routes leading to the sea. The sea, along with rivers and lakes, naturally provided
food and other resources. Moreover, these waters were the major or
[
Longhouses, built
of stone with
thatched roofs,
nestle together in
this reconstruction
of a Norse settlement in Sweden.
A scene from the

Bayeux Tapestry, a
long embroidered
cloth made to commemorate the
Norman conquest
of England in 1066.
The Normans were
descendants of
Vikings who settled
in what is now
France. Their
shipbuilding methods, shown here,
were virtually the
same as those in
Scandinavia.
only way of linking together

widely separated settlements for
trade, government, and other
purposes. Considering how
much Scandinavians depended
on the sea and other waterways,
it is not surprising that they
became expert boatbuilders.
The waters in and around
their homelands were largely
sheltered from strong winds, so
early Scandinavian boats were
slim, light, maneuverable, and
propelled by paddlesrather
like large canoes. By the third
century, most likely, oars had
come into use. They cut through
the waves with greater power
and could propel larger boats, some of which were capable of carrying Scandinavians on occasional voyages to other parts of Europe.
Sails probably were not added until the fifth century, and perhaps
then just in parts of Denmark. On the Baltic island of Gotland, picture stones from the fifth and sixth centuries show only rowing boats;
sailing ships were not portrayed till the seventh century. After that,
ships under sail featured in many Gotland picture stones, which have
been some of our best sources for the appearance of these vessels
and their rigging.
Sails made sense as Scandinavians ventured out of their home
waters more frequently. Sailing ships, which could be built bigger than
rowing boats, were just the thing for crossing the rough northern seas.
In the growing market centers of England and continental Europe, such
[ 18 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
Scandinavian products as amber,

furs, down, iron, sharpening
stones, and walrus ivory were
coming into high demand. Scandinavians, in turn, were eager for
a variety of southern luxury
items, not to mention the silver
coins that some European rulers
were starting to mint.
It soon became obvious to
many Scandinavians that there
was a lot of wealth in places like
Frankia (modern France, Belgium, Netherlands, and Germany). It also became clear that
most coastal towns and monasteries were defenseless. The
majority of Europeans believed
that they only had to fear attack by land and that being next to the sea
helped protect them from enemies. Even if an enemy did come from
the sea, most sailors of that era hugged the coastlines, so their ships
were usually sighted long before they made an attack, giving plenty of
time to prepare a defense. Scandinavian sailors, however, cut directly
across the North Sea, so there was little or no warning of their coming. Moreover, their ships were far superior to any vessel most Europeans knew of or could imagine.
Scandinavian ships were sleek and very fast. Their keel design and
flexible construction made them extremely stable even in heavy
swells. They went under sail at sea, then switched to oars for greater
maneuverability close to land. They had such a shallow draft that they
could navigate rivers that were only a few feet deep. They could run
[
A Gotland picture
stone shows some
of the distinctive
features of a Viking
ship: the single
mast, the large
rectangular sail,
and the high stem
and stern. The men
aboard ship are
armed in typical
Viking fashion,
with conical
helmets and
round shields.
right up onto a beach, then put out to sea again with hardly any delay.
And they were crewed by men who knew how to fight as well as how
to sail. No wonder that some of those men decided they could make
more profit by raiding than trading. Even before the shock of the raid
on Lindisfarne in 793, there was at least one other raid in England,
and there may have already been some attacks on the islands of northern Scotland.
As the eighth century drew to an end, the temptation of all those
wealthy, undefended coastal communities became diffcult to resist
and the Scandinavians had everything they needed to go after these
riches. Their land provided a natural abundance of the essential shipbuilding resources of timber and iron (to make rivets for fastening ship
planks in place). Plus, there were plenty of men with the know-how
to build and sail the ships, and the ambition to take them on voyages
in search of wealth.
The men were motivated, at least in part, by changing conditions
in Scandinavia itself. In some areas an increase in population may have
been making good farmland scarce. Political struggles were becoming
common as Danish kings asserted more authority over local chiefs and
also fought to extend their power into the Scandinavian Peninsula.
Defeated or out-of-favor leaders and their followers were often forced
to leave their homelands. And loot and glory gained abroad gave men
power when they returned home. For these reasons and more, Scandinavian raiders became much more active than they had been in past
centuries. Historians have given the period of this increased activity,
usually dated from 793 to 1066, a handy nickname: the Viking Age.
[ 20 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
WRITING AROUND 1220 , ICELANDIC

historian Snorri Sturluson recounted
the building of one of the Viking Ages
famous ships, which sailed to war in
the year 1000 with more than two hundred men aboard:
BUILDING A SHIP
King Olaf . . . had a great vessel

built which was larger than any
ship in the country. . . . The keel
that rested upon the grass was seventy-four ells [about 120 feet] long.
Thorberg Skaffhog was the name of
the man in charge of making the
stem and stern of the vessel but
there were many others, some to
fell wood, some to shape it, some
to make nails, some to carry timber. All that was used was very
carefully chosen. The ship was long
and broad and strongly timbered.
While they were planking the ship,
it happened that Thorberg had to
go home to his farm on urgent
business and he stayed there a long
time. The ship was planked up on
both sides when he returned. That same evening the king went out with Thorberg to see how the vessel looked and everybody said that so large and beautiful a ship of war had never been seen before. . . . Thorberg was the
master-builder of the ship until she was finished. The ship was a dragon, built
like the one the king had captured in Halogaland but this one was much larger
and more carefully made in all her parts. The king called this ship Long Serpent
and the other Short Serpent. Long Serpent had thirty-four benches for rowers.
The prow and the stern were covered in gilding. . . . This ship was the best and
most costly one ever built in Norway.
Long Serpents
sail fills with
wind as
Norwegian
king Olaf
Tryggvason
leads his
fleet to war.
MEDIEVAL SAGA, OR TALE, ABOUT NORSE SETTLERS IN THE

Orkney Islands (off the northern tip of Scotland) recounted the
annual routine of a landowner named Svein Asleifsson, who lived in
the 1100s. In springtime,
he had more than enough to occupy him, with a great deal of
seed to sow which he saw to carefully himself. Then when that
job was done, he would go off plundering in the Hebrides [a
group of islands in western Scotland] and in Ireland on what he
called his spring-trip; then back home just after midsummer,
where he stayed till the ... fields had been reaped and the grain
was safely in. After that he would go off raiding again, and never
came back till the first month of winter was ended. This he
called his autumn-trip.
Opposite page:
A Viking hero
prepares to slay
a giant serpent in
a carving that
adorns the door
Like Svein Asleifsson, the majority of men who sailed out for plun- of the city hall in
Oslo, the capital
der were not full-time raiders. For most of the year, they occupied of Norway.
23
themselves with the land and its tasks, and

thought of themselves as farmers. Only when
they went away on an expedition would they
be considered Vikings. The Old Norse phrase
fara Viking, usually translated to go aviking, basically meant to go off on a voyage
for profit. That profit might be obtained
through trading or raiding, or a combination of
both. But for those who came to know these
seafarers primarily as raiderssometimes
within Scandinavia itselfViking became
another word for pirate.
IRELAND AND
THE WESTERN ISLES
This painting from

a twelfth-century
English manuscript
shows a band of
Viking raiders coming ashore in the
British Isles.
Although the ships
are drawn very
small and without
masts and sails,
their shape is accurately portrayed.
A year after the raid on Lindisfarne, Vikings

attacked another Northumbrian monastery,
Jarrow. The following year, as chroniclers in
Wales noted, the pagans first came to Ireland
and Racline [Rathlin, an island monastery] was
destroyed. Vikings also sacked at least two
other Irish religious communities that season,
as well as the highly revered monastery of
Iona, off the coast of Scotland.
Monasteries on the coasts and islands of Ireland and western Scotland were the Vikings main targets for the next thirty or so years.
According to Irish chronicles, Iona alone was attacked at least twice
moreburned in 802, and sixty-eight monks killed in 806. This last
event shook the community so much that many of the monks left the
island and established a new monastery in Kells, Ireland, well inland.
Many of the inhabitants of monasteries that remained near the sea
[ 24 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
seem to have lived in a state of constant fear, or at least vigilance. This

is certainly the impression we get from a poem jotted down by a ninthcentury Irish monk:
Bitter is the wind tonight,
White the tresses of the sea;
I have no fear the Viking hordes
Will sail the seas on such a night.
A large part of the monks distress came from the feeling that the
Northmen were singling out holy siteswhich they may have been,
but not for the antireligious reasons Christians thought. The Irish and
Scottish monasteries were not only places of worship and learning but
also centers of arts, crafts, and trade. Churches were full of objects that
were both valuable and portable. In addition, both monasteries and
churches often functioned as safe deposits where local people stored
their riches. To the Vikings, these wealthy, undefended places were
such perfect and easy targets that for a long time they saw no reason
to try their luck elsewhere.
Their luck, however, did not always hold out. Even early on, they
sometimes met with resistance. For example, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle related that during the 794 raid on Jarrow, one of their leaders was
slain, and also some of their ships were wrecked by tempest, and many
of them were drowned, and some came to shore alive, and they were
there slain at the mouth of the river. Nevertheless, attacking monastic settlements was probably less risky for the Vikings than attacking
the well-defended towns of England and Frankia.
BOTH SIDES OF THE CHANNEL
Vikings made a raid in western Frankia in 799, but the Frankish

emperor Charlemagne responded immediately and strongly. He estab[
fighting for loot and land 00000000000000000000 25 ]
A modern artist
imagined this
scene of Charlemagne angrily
watching from a
battlement as
Vikings land on the
Frankish coast.
lished a coastguard, ordered forts built

along the coast, and stationed fleets of
ships at the mouths of rivers. But after
Charlemagne died in 814, his empire began
to fall apart as his heirs fought among
themselves more and more.
Soon the Frankish coasts became vulnerable, nowhere more so than in Frisia (todays
Netherlands and northwest Germany).
Charlemagnes navy no longer existed, and
without a navy, the long, low-lying Frisian
coastline was impossible to protect. Three
times between 834 and 837, Vikings pillaged
the great Frisian trading center of Dorestad.
A Frankish chronicler wrote of the 834 raid
(probably exaggerating somewhat), The
Danes attacked Dorestad and destroyed
everything, slaughtered some people, took
others away captive, and burned the surrounding region.
Since Denmark was only a short sail from Frisia, the Vikings in this
case probably did come from there. The Franks and the English, however, often referred to all Scandinavian raiders as Danes, regardless of
where in Scandinavia they actually came from. (The earlier Vikings
who harried Ireland and western Scotland were probably from Norway
for the most part.) In any case, the Northmen were now turning their
ambitions to both sides of the English Channel. The Anglo-Saxon
Chronicle records renewed Viking activity in England beginning in 835,
when heathen men ravaged [the island of] Sheppey. The next year,
the ruler of the southern English kingdom of Wessex fought with
twenty-five ship companies at Carhampton, and there was great
slaughter; the Danes held the battlefield.
[ 26 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
The Northmen not only carried off valuables but also people, whom
they held for ransom or sold into slavery. What they could not take away,
they sometimes destroyed. This kind of violence was not at all unusual
in early medieval Europe but, to their victims, the Vikings seemed to
carry it to a great extreme. The attacks were the more terrifying because
of their unexpectedness and lightning swiftness. By the time a Viking
ship or fleet was sighted, there was no chance to prepare a defense
before the raiders landed. And by the time a counterattack could be
launched, the Northmen were already back in their ships, sailing away.
By the middle of the ninth century, few places in western Europe
were safe from Viking raids. In 844 a fleet reached Muslim-ruled Iberia
and fell upon Lisbon, Cadiz, and Seville before the Arab army stopped
their progress. Elsewhere the Northmen were sailing up rivers, striking ever farther inland. They attacked not just villages, monasteries,
and small towns, but cities such as London, Paris, and Hamburg.
A Frankish chronicle told how
in 845, the Northmen with a
hundred ships entered the
Seine on the twentieth of
March and, after ravaging first
one bank and then the other,
came without meeting any
resistance to Paris. The king,
Charles the Bald, realized he
could not defeat them, so paid
them 7,000 pounds of silver to
leave. They sailed back up the
Seine peaceably enough, but
coming to the ocean pillaged,
destroyed, and burned all the
regions along the coast.
[
The Viking attack

on Paris in 845
was remembered
for hundreds of
years, as this
illustration, made
in 1884, shows.
SETTLING IN
In the early decades of the Viking Age, raids were hit-and-run affairs. The
Northmen generally went on expeditions only in the summer months
and then sailed back to their homes. But in the winter of 842 they broke
this pattern in Frankia and established themselves on an island near the
mouth of the Loire River. Vikings wintered in England for the first time
in 850, on the small island of Thanet in the southeast. From such bases
the Northmen continued to head out on raids. For some Scandinavians,
year-round raiding was developing into a way of life.
This had also become apparent in Ireland, where Vikings first stayed
the winter in 839 or 840. In 841 they established a longphort, a fortified landing place for their ships, at Dublin. The next year an Irish
chronicler noted, Pagans still in Dublinclearly he had not expected
them to stay. But not only did they remain in Dublin, they founded other
longphorts that became permanent towns. From these they made
forays ever deeper into the country. They seemed to be everywhere.
A chronicle entry for the year 847 claimed, After they had been under
attack from the Vikings for many years, the Irish were made tributaries
to them; the Vikings have possessed themselves without opposition of
all the islands round about and have settled on them. In fact, there was
opposition: several times during the 800s, Irish kings left off their feuding with one another and fought the Northmen, often succesfully. Nevertheless, Vikings continued to raid and settle through much of Ireland.
The same kind of thing was happening elsewhere. By the middle
of the ninth century, Norwegian Vikings were well established in northern Scotland, especially in the Shetland and Orkney Islands. Probably
during the same period they were colonizing the Isle of Man in the Irish
Sea. Some settlements were also made in southwest Wales. In many
cases these Viking colonies in the British Isles were no longer just bases
for raidsthey also became places where the Norse settled down to
farm and raise their families.
[ 28 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
PIRATE ISLANDS
IT IS RELATED THAT IN THE DAYS OF HARALD FINEHAIR [died around 940], THE KING
of Norway, the islands of Orkney, which before had been only a resort for Vikings, were
settled. This sentence from one of the sagas confirms that Vikings had been using the
Scottish islands as a base for some time. And they continued to do so long after they
established permanent homes and farms. Another saga relates,
One summer Harald Finehair sailed west to punish the Vikings, as he had grown
tired of their depredations, for they harried in Norway during the summer, but
spent the winter in Shetland or the Orkneys. He subdued Shetland and the
Orkneys ... he fought there many battles and annexed the land farther west than
any Norwegian king has done since.
Coming under control of the Norwegian crown may have stopped the Shetland and
Orkney Islanders from raiding in Norway, but it didnt keep them from sailing south to
prey on other targets. The Orkneyman we met on p. 23, Svein Asleifsson, was still at it
in the twelfth century, leading a band of eighty warriors in seasonal raids on Ireland,
Wales, and the Hebrides Islands. In 1171 he even took part in an effort to capture Dublin.
It was his last adventure: the attempt failed, and Svein was killed in the fighting.
Above: King Harald Finehair with a Viking leader named Guthrum,
from a fourteenth-century Icelandic manuscript
ARMIES OF CONQUEST
A twentiethcentury mural in
the Houses of
Parliament in
London shows King
Alfreds forces
fighting the Danes.
In 866 a new chapter opened in the story of the Vikings. That year, said
the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, a great heathen force came into English
land, and they took winter-quarters in East Anglia. This force has
become known as the Great Army, although it was not really the kind
of organized body we think of as an army. It probably numbered a few
thousand men, mostly from Denmark, under a number of different
leaders. In 867 they besieged and captured York, the capital of
Northumbria. The kingdoms of East Anglia and Mercia fell to the Great
Army in the 870s. Only Wessex, Englands southernmost kingdom, was
able to resist, thanks to the leadership (and good luck) of its king,
Alfred the Great.
[ 30 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
For a decade the Great Army roamed England during the summers,
fighting and looting along the way, and spent the winters in various fortified camps. But in 876 one of the commanders, Halfdan, divided
Northumbria among his men, who settled down to farmthey were
ploughing and providing for themselves, says the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. In the next few years Mercia and East Anglia were shared out to
other divisions of the Great Army. In a treaty of 886, Alfred the Great
formally ceded most of Northumbria, half of Mercia, and all of East
Anglia to the Vikings.
The sizeable portion of eastern and northern England under Viking
control became known as the Danelaw. Its raiders-turned-farmers were
soon joined by new Scandinavian immigrants. The Danelaws greatest
center was York, which became the capital of the Kingdom of York. The
city, located on Englands major north-south land route, attracted merchants from all over the Viking world. Crafts and trade flourished, and
by 1000 York was the second-largest city in England (after London), with
a population nearing 10,000.
In 902 Alfred the Greats son and successor, Edward, began to conquer
the Danelaw. That same year the Norwegian Vikings of Dublin were driven
out of Ireland, and many of them migrated to York. They returned to Ireland beginning in 915 and refounded Dublin and other bases, which developed into thriving trading centers. A number of these still exist today as
important Irish cities, including Limerick, Waterford, Wexford, and Cork.
Back in England, in 917 Edward and his sister Aethelflaed, queen of
Mercia, decisively defeated the Scandinavians of the Danelaw. By the
next year the Danes controlled only the Kingdom of York. Its king had
planned to surrender to Aethelflaed, but she died before that could happen. Instead Rognvald, the Norwegian ruler of Dublin, took over York
in 919. During the next decades the kingdom changed hands several
times; the last Viking king of York was the Norwegian Erik Bloodaxe,
killed in battle in 954.
[
WHEN A SCANDINAVIAN MAN WENT OFF A-VIKING, HE DIDNT HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT
leaving his farmat least if he was married. His wife would both run and protect the
farm in his absence. Viking Age women were expected to be as strong, brave, and
resourceful as men. But while a man could earn honor and respect by gaining wealth
and doing great deeds abroad, a woman earned honor
and respect by wisely using and guarding that wealth at
home. It was she who carried the keys for the familys
storerooms and storage chests.
Sometimes, though, women did go abroad with their
menfolk. There is little evidence of women participating in raids, but plenty of evidence
of their presence on other Viking voyages. A great many Scandinavian women left their
homelands to settle in Viking colonies. Most of these women emigrated with their husbands, but there were also widows who settled independently. In addition, we know
that Scandinavian merchants sometimes traveled with their wives, and it is possible that
some traveling women were merchants in their own right.
Even when women didnt go a-viking themselves, they made it possible for others
to do so, and not just by tending the home fires while the men were away. Spinning
and weaving cloth was womens work, so it was women who made the woolen sails for
Viking ships. One scholar has estimated that the sail of a Viking warship required more
than 930 square feet of clothenough fabric to make clothes for forty people. Thats
a lot of spinning and weaving!
VIKING
WOMEN
Above: Viking women were expected to be strong and brave. A modern Russian artist
imagines an ideal Viking princess in this portrait.
Many members of the Great Army had chosen not

to settle in England but went on to raid Frankia. The
number of ships grows, wrote the monk Ermentarius around 860. The endless stream of Vikings never
ceases to increase. Everywhere the Christians are the
victims of massacres, burnings, plunderings: the
Vikings conquer all in their path, and no one resists
them . . . and an innumerable fleet sails up the Seine
and the evil grows in the whole region. Ermentarius
listed cities throughout what is now France that had
been laid wastebesieged, plundered, captured,
and/or burned.
In 911 the Frankish king Charles the Simple granted
land around Rouen, near the mouth of the Seine River,
to a Viking leader known as Rollo. In exchange, Rollo
agreed to defend northern Frankia from other Vikings,
and for several years he and his men did so. Then
Rollo began leading raids on Frankish territory himself. He greatly extended the region under his control,
and his son continued this process. The area settled
by Rollos Northmen was named Normandy after them. Rollos descendants, who became Christians, ruled as the dukes of Normandy for generations afterward.
In 914 Rollo also helped a large Viking army conquer Brittany (now,
like Normandy, part of France). But the Norwegians in Brittany never
settled down to farm or trade. They simply continued to plunder the
region until the Bretons at last drove them out in 939. That was the
end of large-scale Viking activity in Frankia, although isolated raids
occurred into the eleventh century. Meanwhile, Viking energies found
outlets on the familiar coasts around the Irish Sea, and also in unfamiliar and far-off places to both west and east.
[
Rollo, shown here

dressed as a
French knight,
was also known as
Hrolf the Walker.
He got his nickname, it was said,
because he was
too large for any
horse to carry, so
he had to walk
everywhere.
TTAR, THE MERCHANT WE MET ON PAGE 14, VISITED THE

court of Alfred the Great in the 880s and, at the kings request,
described his homeland: He said that the land of the Norwegians was
very long and very narrow. All that they can either graze or plough lies
by the sea; and even that is very rocky in some places; and to the east,
and alongside the cultivated land, lie wild mountains. No wonder,
then, that Norwegians wanting more farmland looked to the west,
across the sea. And from southern Norway, given good weather, it
would take only twenty-four hours of sailing to reach the Shetland
Islands. South of these were the Orkneys, and then mainland Scotland.
As we have already seen, Northmen were quite familiar with these
areas by the early ninth century.
Soon, though, there were rumors of even more lands in the sea to
the west. Around 825 an Irish monk named Dicuil wrote of a set of
small islands, nearly all separated by narrow stretches of water; in these
for nearly a hundred years hermits sailing from our country, Ireland,
35
Opposite page:
Vikings explore
the seas in
a quest for
more land.
have lived. But . . . now because of the Northman pirates they are emptied of anchorites [hermits], and are filled with countless sheep and
very many diverse kinds of seabirds. Indeed, the Norwegian Vikings
who settled these islands in the ninth century named them the
Faeroessheep islands.
According to the sagas, the first Norse settler in the Faeroes was a
man named Grim Kamban. Then, in the days of King Harald Finehair
a great number of people fled [from Norway] because of his tyranny.
Some settled in the Faeroes and made their home there, while others
went to other uninhabited countries. King Haralds efforts to bring all
of Norway under his rule did in fact threaten the independence and land
rights of many chieftains, no doubt inspiring a number of them to emigrate. But colonization of the uninhabited countries was probably
under way at least ten years before Haralds reign began in the 870s.
ICELAND
The discovery and settlement of Iceland were recorded in histories and

sagas composed in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. These tales
were sometimes highly embellished, but they were often based on local
traditions and memories handed down through the descendants of the
founding families. They told how the first Scandinavians to find their
way to Iceland were a Norwegian, Naddod, followed by a Swede, Gardar Svafarsson. Neither man attempted to settle the land theyd found,
but word of their voyages spread.
Around 860, Floki Vilgerdarson left Norway planning not only to
explore the North Atlantic island but to settle on it. He stopped at the
Shetlands and Faeroes along the way, then headed northwest. With him
he brought three ravens, birds sacred to the god Odin. Not knowing how
long or far he was supposed to sail, he released the first raven, which
flew back toward the Faeroes. After going farther, he released the second bird, which circled overhead and then returned to the ship. Floki
[ 36 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
sailed on. Then he let loose the third

raven, and it flew straight ahead to the
horizon. Floki followed, and at last
sighted land.
He and his men beached their ship
in an inlet. The history relates,
The fjord teemed with fish of all
kinds, and they were so busy fishing that they paid no heed to gathering hay for the winter; and that
winter, all their livestock died.
The following spring was an
extremely cold one. Flki
climbed a high mountain and
looked north towards the coast,
and saw a fjord choked with drift-ice; and so they called the
country sland [Iceland], and that has been its name ever since.
A year later Floki returned to Norway, convinced that Iceland was not
worth settling. But a couple of his men thought otherwise. One was
careful to describe both the good points and bad points of the island.
The other was so enthusiastic about Icelands advantages that he
claimed butter dripped from every blade of grass.
One sure advantage was that Iceland had no human inhabitants, so
the land was free for the taking. This was enough of a lure to persuade
many people to gather their families and livestock, pack up their most
important possessions, and attempt the potentially dangerous ocean
crossing. The sagas say that the first successful settlers were two men
named Ingolf and Hjorleif, who had lost their lands in Norway when
they had to pay compensation for murders theyd committed.
[
exploring in the west 000000000000000000000000 37 ]
Iceland had plenty

of free land, but
many other
resources were
limited. The wood
for this panel (part
of a scene of Jesus
with Christian
saints, carved in
the 1000s or 1100s)
had to be imported
from Norway.
ONE OF ICELANDS MOST PROMINENT SETTLERS WAS AUD THE DEEP-MINDED,

whose father had been the Norse ruler of the Hebrides. After her husband, a Norse king
of Dublin, was killed, she returned to the Hebrides. From there her son Thorstein conquered northern Scotland, and she went to live in his new domain. Then the Scots
betrayed him, and he fell there in battle. Upon
learning of her sons death, Aud caused a merchant ship to be made in a wood, in secret, and
when it was ready she held out to the Orkneys;
there she gave in marriage Gro, the daughter of Thorstein. Next she stopped in the
Faeroes, where she arranged the marriage of another of Thorsteins daughters. Afterward she headed for Iceland, where two of her brothers were already settled. She stayed
with one brother for the winter, then went to seek a settlement . . . accompanied by
her liegemen. They traveled by ship, of course, and after a day or so of sailing, she
AUD THE
DEEP-MINDED
selected an extensive territory along a bay in western Iceland. But she did not keep all
this land for herself: Aud gave lands to her shipmates and freed-men. After settling
her followers, she proceeded to arrange marriages for Thorsteins remaining daughters. The Book of Settlements, which tells of these events, praises Aud as a great lady
of state. It continues, when she was weary with old age, she invited her friends, followers, and extensive family to a most stately feast; and whenas the feast had stood
for three nights, she bestowed gifts upon her friends, and gave them wholesome counsels. . . . The next night she died, and was buried on the shore.
Above: After the deaths of her husband and son, Aud the Deep-Minded took charge of her familys
fortunes, sailing from Scotland to the Orkneys to the Faeroe Islands and, finally, to Iceland.
Upon arrival, Hjorleif immediately chose a site on the southern

coast. Ingolf, on the other hand, tossed the wooden pillars that supported his high seat into the waves, trusting that the gods would use
them to lead him to a good place. It was said that it took him nearly
three years to find where the pillars had washed ashore. When he did,
he built his home there, near the site of Reykjavik, modern Icelands
capital. Hjorleif, however, met an unhappy end, murdered by his slaves.
These slaves were people Hjorleif had captured during raids on Ireland. There were quite a few Irish and Scottish slaves among Icelands
early settlers. The Scandinavian
colonists were mostly from western Norway, but there were also
Danes, Swedes, and Saami. Some
of these settlers came direct from
Scandinavia, while others emigrated from the Norse colonies in
Scotland and Ireland. A number of
the Vikings expelled from Dublin
in 902 decided to try their luck in
Iceland instead of York.
By 930 some twenty thousand
people lived in Iceland, farming
and raising livestock on the fertile
lands of the coasts and river valleys. In this year the islands leading chieftains established the Althing,
a kind of national assembly that met for two weeks every June. From
all over Iceland, people came to the plain of Thingvellir, where an
elected official known as the Lawspeaker proclaimed the laws. Courts
met to settle quarrels and feudsby negotiation if possible, but by punishments such as exile if necessary. The Althing was also a great social
occasion, with far-flung family members reuniting, young people court[
A meeting of Icelands Althing, with

the Lawspeaker
presiding from the
rock at the center.
The artist, W. G.
Collingwood,
researched the
paintings details
during a trip to Iceland in the 1870s.
ing, peddlers and merchants selling

their wares, and travelers sharing
news of their voyages.
GREENLAND
Erik the Red aboard

his ship. His helmet
is pure fantasy, but
his sword, clothes,
beard, and mustache
are close to styles
seen in Viking Age
art and artifacts.
Around 980 a hot-tempered settler

named Erik the Red was convicted
of manslaughter and banished
from Iceland for three years. Erik
had heard tales of some new land
to the west and decided to find
it and spend his exile there. So it
was that Erik came to the huge
island he named Greenland. When
he returned to Iceland in 986 he
recruited twenty-five shiploads of
settlers to join him in colonizing
the new land. Fourteen reached it,
some were driven back [to Iceland]
and some were lost.
That brief statement from the
Icelandic Book of Settlements highlights the risks of these oversea
voyages. The dangers included
storms, high waves, whirlpools, and
floating sea ice. Unfavorable winds
could double or triple a journeys length or blow a ship completely off
course. Even when sailing close to landwhich Norse navigators tried
to do whenever possiblethere were hazards for ships, such as fog and
darkness that hid rocky coasts or outcrops. Viking Age travelers usually tried to avoid night sailing for this reason.
[ 40 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
NORSE SAILORS DID NOT HAVE COMPASSES OR OTHER SOPHISTICATED INSTRUMENTS TO

guide them on their voyages. They mainly relied on things like their knowledge of
weather patterns, animal behavior,
and landmarks. Such information was
passed on from sailor to sailor, down
the generations. A thirteenth-century
Icelandic manuscript preserved some
traditional directions for navigating the North Atlantic. Although most of the placenames may be unfamiliar, this is an interesting example of how the Norse found their
way across the sea and of how long it took them to get
from one land to another, at least when the winds
were right and the seas were calm.
SAILING TIMES
AND GUIDELINES
Wise men say that from Stad in Norway it is seven days sailing to Horn
in eastern Iceland, but from Snaefellsnes [a peninsula in western
Iceland] it is four days sailing to
Hvarf in Greenland. From Hernar
in Norway one should keep sailing
west to reach Hvarf in Greenland
and then you are sailing north of
Shetland, so that it can only be seen
if visibility is very good, but south of
the Faeroes, so that the sea appears halfway up their mountain slopes, but so far
south of Iceland that one is only aware of birds
and whales from it. From Reykjanes in southern Iceland it is three days sailing south to Slyne Head in Ireland; but from Langanes
in northern Iceland it is four days sailing north to Svalbardi at the end of the
ocean, but a days sailing to the wastes of Greenland from Kolbeinsey [an island
north of Iceland] to the north.
Above: A silver coin minted around 825 in Hedeby, Denmark, depicts a cargo ship with its sail furled.
A peaceful voyage that went exactly as planned still had its share
of hardships. Settlers sailed in a type of cargo ship called a knorr.
Knorrs were broader, deeper, and sturdier than the fast, sleek longships
used in Viking raids. But every bit of space in the knorr would be
crammed full with the livestock and possessions of the ships crew and
their families. Only cold food could be eaten during the journey, since
cooking posed too great a risk of fire. The sole shelter from the elements may have been a rough tent. There was no privacy, and no place
to go to the bathroom except over the ships side. The farm animals
wouldnt even bother with that, and they were even more likely to get
seasick than the human passengers were.
Once the settlers reached their destination, hardships continued.
Timber was not abundant in the North Atlantic colonies, where most
of the trees (if any) were small birches and willows. Houses were generally built from stone or blocks of turf, and tools often had to be made
from driftwood or bone. Wood for shipbuilding had to be imported.
Some North Atlantic islands also lacked other natural resources that
Scandinavians traditionally depended on, such as iron and soapstone
(commonly used to make cooking pots, fishing sinkers, and other useful items). The colonies relied on trade with mainland Europe for many
of their needs.
Unlike in the Faeroes and Iceland, it was impossible to grow grain
and other food crops in Greenland, even in the warmest, most sheltered areas. These places did offer good pastureland for livestock, however. The Greenlanders were also able to raise hay so that they could
feed their animals during the winter. In addition, Greenlanders hunted
caribou, birds, and sea animals for food and for resources such as bone,
antler, oil, and furs. Moreover, many made seasonal hunting trips to the
islands freezing northwest coast to procure walrus ivory, polar bear
skins, and other animal products that brought high prices in Europe.
Trading in such luxury items was essential since Greenlanders, even
[ 42 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
more than other Scandinavian colonists in the North

Atlantic, depended heavily on imports.
Despite all the challenges, Erik the Red and his companions, and their descendants after them, built good lives
for themselves. Eventually there were three settlements, home to a population of at least a couple
thousand people. As for Erik, the former outlaw
became Greenlands leading citizen. He also passed
his resourcefulness and spirit of adventure on to
his children, who made some of the worlds most
historic voyages of exploration.
A NEW WORLD
In 986 an off-course Icelandic merchant named

Bjarni Herjolfsson happened upon lands even farther to the west than Greenland. Because he
wanted to get to Greenland as quickly as possible
(his parents had unexpectedly immigrated there
while he was off on a trading voyage), he never went ashore. He did,
however, tell some of the Greenlanders about the lands he had sighted.
Around the year 1000, Erik the Reds son Leif set out to find them.
Leifs nickname was the Lucky, and he certainly had good fortune
as an explorer. He found what he was looking for, and he became (as
far as we know) the first European to set foot in North America. He and
his crew explored a region he named Vinland, which most scholars
believe was in southeastern Canada. After spending the winter there,
the Greenlanders returned home.
Then, says the saga, There was great discussion of Leifs Vinland
voyage and his brother Thorvald felt they had not explored enough of
the land. Thorvald therefore led thirty men to Leifs Vinland base,
Leifsbudir, and they spent two summers in further exploration.
[
This twelfthcentury chess

piece came from
one of the Norseruled Hebrides
Islands. It was
crafted from walrus ivory, one of
Greenlands most
valuable exports.
A reconstructed
Viking longhouse at
LAnse aux Meadows. Based on
archaeologists discoveries, it was
built almost entirely
with squares of turf.
In Viking times the
wooden parts, such
as the door frames,
were probably made
from driftwood.
Although Leif and his men had not encountered any of the natives of
North America, Thorvald and his party did. Unfortunately violence
broke out, and there were deaths on both sides; Thorvald was one of
those killed.
The next summer, Icelandic merchant Thorfinn Karlsefni arrived at
Erik the Reds farm. There he married Gudrid, the widow of Eriks son
Thorstein (who had also sailed for Vinland at one point, but had been
unable to reach it). Gudrid and Thorfinn decided to continue the explorations. Thorfinn hired himself a crew of sixty men and five women.
. . . Then they put out to sea and arrived without mishap at Leifsbudir.
After a time they established a base named Straumfjord, from which
they could strike out to explore the land further and trade with its
natives. Some scholars believe that Straumfjord was at the place now
known as LAnse aux Meadows in Newfoundland. In any case, archaeologists have found plenty of evidence that LAnse aux Meadows was
a substantial Viking base where as many as ninety people could have
lived. The finds have given other valuable information, too. For example, iron rivets show that ships were repaired here, while a soapstone
spindle whorl (part of the equipment for spinning wool) shows that
women were part of this community, just as the sagas say.
[ 44 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
At first Gudrid and Thorfinns party traded

peaceably with the areas Native Americans. But
before long the explorers were fighting with the
natives as well as quarreling among themselves.
After two winters they decided to return to
Greenland, taking with them plenty of the lands
products, which included wood, furs, and dried
grapes or berries. There was also a new member
of their party: Gudrid and Thorfinns son Snorri,
the first European child born in North America.
Discussion soon began again of a Vinland
voyage, since the trip seemed to bring men both
wealth and renown. The leader of the new venture was Leifs sister Freydis, who invited two
Norwegian men to join her. However, their ship
reached Vinland before hers did, and they tried
to take over Leifsbudir. Even after that situation was resolved, hostilities between Freydis and the Norwegians only increased. The conflict
became so bad during the winter that Freydis had her men kill the Norwegian men, and she herself killed the women who had sailed with
them. Freydis returned successfully to Greenland in the spring, her ship
loaded with the produce of Vinland.
This is how the story of Freydis goes in one of the sagas. In the other
surviving version of her deeds, Freydis is a heroine, defending her fellow explorers against an attack by Native Americans. But whatever the
truth may have been, the sagas tell of no further Norse explorations
of Vinland after her voyage. Nevertheless, other texts, along with
archaeological finds, make it clear that Greenlanders continued to
travel to North America for timber, iron, and other resources well into
the fourteenth century. After that, however, the Greenland colonies
died out, and there was no further Norse contact with the New World.
[
An inside view of
the LAnse aux
Meadows longhouse. People
worked, ate, and
slept on the raised
platform along the
side. A central
hearth provided
light and heat.
GREENLANDERS SAGA, PRESERVED IN A SINGLE FOURTEENTH-CENTURY MANUSCRIPT,

is one of our earliest records of European exploration in North America. Here is the
story of Leif Erikssons remarkable journey:
There was now much talk [in Greenland] of looking for new lands. Leif . . . sought
out Bjarni and purchased his ship. He hired himself a crew numbering thirtyfive men. . . .
Once they had made the ship ready they put to sea and found first the land
which Bjarni and his companions had seen last. They sailed up to the shore and
cast anchor, put out a boat and
rowed ashore. There they found no
grass, but large glaciers covered the
highlands and the land was like a
single flat slab of rock from the glaciers to the sea. This land seemed to them of little use. Leif then spoke: As far
as this land is concerned it cant be said of us as of Bjarni that we did not set
foot on shore. I am now going to name this land and call it Helluland [stoneslab land].
They then returned to their ship, put out to sea and found a second land.
Once more they sailed close to the shore and cast anchor, put out a boat and
THE VOYAGE OF
LEIF THE LUCKY
Above: Leif Eriksson, manning his ships steering oar, sights the North American coast,
as imagined by Norwegian artist Christian Krohg.
went ashore. This land was flat and forested, sloping gently seaward, and they
came across many beaches of white sand. Leif then spoke: This land shall be
named for what it has to offer and called Markland [forest land]. . . .
After this they sailed out to sea and spent two days at sea with a northeasterly wind before they saw land. They sailed toward it and came to an island,
which lay to the north of the land, where they went ashore. In the fine weather
they found dew on the grass, which they collected in their hands and drank of,
and thought they had never tasted anything as sweet.
Afterwards they returned to their ship. . . . They rounded the headland and
steered westward. . . . Their curiosity to see the land was so great that they . . .
ran ashore where a river flowed into the sea from a lake. . . . They carried their
sleeping sacks ashore and built booths. Later they decided to
spend the winter there and built large houses.
There was no lack of salmon both in the lake and the river,
and this salmon was larger than they had ever seen before. It
seemed to them the land was good, that the livestock would
need no fodder during the winter. The temperature never
dropped below freezing and the grass only withered very
slightly. . . .
When they finished building their houses, Leif spoke to his
companions: I want to divide our company into two groups,
as I want to explore the land. One half is to remain at home
by the longhouses while the other half explores. . . . This they
did for some time. Leif accompanied them sometimes, and at
other times remained at home by the houses. Leif was a large,
strong man, of very striking appearance and wise, as well as
being a man of moderation in all things.
One evening it happened that one man, Tyrker [the German], was missing
from their company. . . . [Tyrker returned and] he spoke in Norse: I had gone
only a bit farther than the rest of you. But I have news to tell you; I found
grapevines and grapes . . . [I am sure because] where I was born there was no
lack of grapevines and grapes. . . .
When spring came they made the ship ready and set sail. Leif named the land
for its natural features and called it Vinland [wineland]. They headed out to sea
and had favorable winds, until they came in sight of Greenland.
Salmon were
part of the
natural abundance that
inspired Leif
Eriksson and
other Greenlanders to
consider colonizing North
America.
N 859 TWO VIKINGS NAMED BJORN IRONSIDE AND HASTEIN LED

a fleet of sixty-two ships south from western Frankia, around Iberia,
and into the Mediterranean. A Frankish chronicler summarized their
further exploits: The Danish pirates having made a long sea-voyage
(for they had sailed between Spain and Africa) entered the Rhne,
where they pillaged many cities and monasteries and established themselves on the island called Camargue. . . . Thence they went on toward
Italy, capturing and plundering Pisa and other cities. Bjorn and Hastein
may have continued south after that, and then possibly ventured into
the eastern Mediterranean. Eventually, however, they headed back to
Frankia, having raided some more in Spain and even in North Africa
on the way. Although only twenty ships returned from the three-year
adventure, it made Bjorn and Hastein rich and famous. Their voyage
had been the most ambitious Viking expedition up to that time. But
already, the quest for wealth and glory was taking other Scandinavians
even farther to the east.
49
Opposite page:
This painting is
an example of
the common portrayal of Vikings
as bloodthirsty
barbarians. It is
wrong in nearly
all its details,
from the chunky
ships to the
horned helmets,
but it does give
us a sense of the
imprint the
Vikings have left
on the popular
imagination.
SWEDES IN RUSSIA
While Danish and Norwegian Vikings were raiding and settling in western Europe and the North Atlantic, the Vikings of Sweden directed their
energies mainly eastward to the lands that now make up Poland,
Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Russia, and Ukraine. In these areas
they were usually known as the Rus. This term may have come from
a word that meant a crew of oarsmen, which was also the basis of a
Finnish name for the Swedes, Ruotsi.
The Rus were warrior-merchants. They went east to trade furs,
hides, down, walrus ivory, amber, honey, beeswax, falcons, and slaves
for silk, wine, fruit, spices, jewelry, glassware, and, above all, silver
coins from the Arab empire based in Baghdad. The empires merchants
were widely traveled, and their currency was in use throughout the
east. More than 100,000 Arab coins have been found in hoards buried
in Sweden. This is probably just a small fraction of the coinage acquired
from the Islamic world, though, since Scandinavians typically melted
the silver down and used it to make neck rings, arm rings, and other
jewelrywearable wealth.
Scandinavian and
Slavic traders
barter goods at
a seasonal
marketplace.
[ 50 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
Rus warrior-merchants
portage, or carry their
boat overland. Portaging was the best way
to travel between
waterways.
From trade centers such as the Swedish town of Birka and the island
of Gotland, the Rus crossed the Baltic Sea, then followed one of several routes into eastern Europe. On these routes they sailed lakes and
rivers and, where necessary, hauled their boats overland to get from
one river to the next. One of the first stops was Staraya Ladoga, home
to Scandinavian, Finnish, and Slavic craftspeople and merchants since
around 750. Here the Rus could acquire, sell, or warehouse goods; have
boats built or repaired; and hire guides to help them get through river
rapids to the south. Following the river from Staraya Ladoga would lead
the Rus to an even richer and more important town, Novgorod. Then
the river route continued south to another major center, Kiev on the
Dnieper River.
The early years of Novgorod and Kiev were surrounded by legend,
as related in an early Russian chronicle:
There arose strife amongst [the Slavic tribes] and they began to
fight amongst themselves. And they said to themselves, Let us
find a king to rule over us and make judgements according to
[ trading
and raiding in the east 000000000000000000 51 ]
the law. And they crossed the

sea. . . . And to the Rus [they]
said, Our land is large and
rich, but there is no order in it.
So come and be king and rule
over us. And three brothers
with their kinsfolk were chosen. . . . The eldest, Rurik,
settled in Novgorod. . . . And
from these [Rus] the Russian
land got its name.
According to
legend, the Slavs
invited Rurik to be
their king and
rule over them.
The chronicle went on to say that

after Rurik died, his successor Oleg
(the Slavic form of the Norse name
Helgi) captured Kiev from two other
Rus leaders around 880. He then set
himself up as prince of Kiev, and
declared that it should be the mother
of Russian cities.
Archaeological finds have shown
that in the ninth century, Scandinavian warriors and merchants made
up an elite population in Novgorod,
Kiev, and other centers. Although these Scandinavians were not a majority, they appear to have been in control. Under their influence, the Russian settlements they used as trading bases became thriving, wealthy cities.
Many Rus merchants passed through these centers, making only
brief stops before going on to the next destination. Others would live
and trade in a town for part of the year and spend the rest of the year
at home in Sweden. Still others brought their families and made Staraya
[ 52 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
Ladoga, Novgorod, Kiev, or some other town their permanent home.

But even when they settled down, their lives were not entirely peaceable. The city-based warrior-merchants exercised power over the people of the surrounding countryside and collected tribute from them, if
necessary by force. The tribute was made up of furs and similar goods
that the Rus could then trade for other goods or for silver. Many Rus
also raided the countryside for slaves, since they made some of their
largest profits as slave dealers.
THE GREAT CITY
Every June, Rus merchants gathered in Kiev, waiting for the Dnieper
to settle down after the spring floods. Then, joining together in a
large fleet for mutual protection, they set sail down the river. In most
places the Dnieper was wide and smooth, but on its lower reach
there was a series of perilous rapids. Sometimes the merchants tried
to steer through them, guided by crewmen who stripped off their
clothes, got into the water, and felt their way over the rocks with
their bare feet. This was no doubt a dangerous procedure, and there
were times when it could not even be attempted. Then the Rus took
their ships out of the water and moved them overland on wooden
rollers (cut from the nearby forest as needed) till they reached the
next stretch of smooth water. But this, too, was dangerous, because
local raiders often lay hidden in the woods, waiting to attack when
the Rus were most vulnerable.
If all went well, the ships finally came to the Black Sea and sailed
across to their goal: the splendid, sprawling city of Constantinople, capital of the Byzantine Empire. Scandinavians knew it simply as Miklagardr, Great City. Here the Rus found throngs of buyers for their slaves
and northern products; markets full of choice goods from all around
the eastern Mediterranean and even from distant parts of Asia; and
plenty of silver.
[ trading
Occasionally, however, the Rus were not content with what they
could trade for in Constantinoples markets. Around 860 they brought
a large fleet to pillage the city and surrounding areas. They stayed for
ten days. Raids occurred again in 907 (reportedly led by Oleg of Kiev),
941, and 944. To secure peace, the Byzantines made a series of treaties
with the Rus, who agreed not to set up a base at the mouth of the
Dnieper, not to bring weapons into the city, not to enter the city without an official escort or written permissionin general, not to cause
trouble for the Byzantines. In return, the Rus received easy access to
supplies, special trading privileges, and free food, lodgings, and baths.
The emperor also made formal arrangements for recruiting Scandinavian warriors to fight in his armies.
Byzantine emperors had been hiring Swedish mercenaries since at
least the 830s. In 988 the emperor established an elite, largely Scandinavian unit called the Varangian Guard. The name may come from
the Old Norse word meaning oath or vow. As the eleventh-century
The Byzantine
emperor visits one
of Constantinoples
churches, well
protected by the
members of the
Varangian Guard
riding behind him.
[ 54 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
Byzantine historian Anna Comnena (daughter of one emperor and sister of another) wrote, They regard loyalty to the emperors . . . as a family tradition, a kind of sacred trust. . . ; this allegiance they preserve
inviolate and will never brook the slightest hint of betrayal.
Serving in the Varangian Guard was a good way for men to make
their reputation and their fortune. The pay was high and often supplemented by war booty and rich gifts from the emperor. Plus, the prestige of having fought for the emperor of the Great City was bound to
enhance a mans status when he returned to Scandinavia. Not surprisingly, Icelanders, Danes, and Norwegians were soon eager to join the
Swedes as Varangian recruits. One of the Norwegians even acquired
enough wealth and renown during his nine-year service to pave his way
to the throne: three years after his return from Constantinople, he
became King Harald Hardradi of Norway.
FARTHER EAST
While many Rus went south soon after crossing the Baltic from Sweden, others continued eastward to reach the upper Volga. They had
learned that this river would lead them to the very source of Arab silver. They sailed the Volga River to its outlet in the Caspian Sea, then
traded along its shores. Some Rus may also have unloaded their ships
and switched to camel caravans to travel through northern Persia. We
are not certain, but Rus could even have reached the capital of the
Islamic world, Baghdada city far more wealthy and impressive than
Constantinople. Usually the Rus were content just to trade in the
strongly defended Arab lands, but there was occasional raiding. For
instance, while sailing the Caspian in 912, some Rus attacked Baku and
other shoreline communities.
In the tenth century it became rare for the Rus to go so far south.
The rulers of Baghdad had been expanding their trade and working out
agreements with peoples north of the Caspian Sea. As a result, there
[ trading
Rurik and his

brothers in a 1986
painting by Russian
artist Ilya Glazunov.
The helmets and
jewelry are modeled on finds from
Sweden. Viking Age
wood carvings
show men with
neatly combed and
trimmed beards
and mustaches like
Rurik wears here.
were now great trading centers along the Volga where Arab merchants
came to do business. So, therefore, did the Rus. One of these cities was
Bulgar, the end of a route along which silk was brought from China,
and therefore a bustling meeting place of traders and travelers from
many places and cultures.
It was while on the way to Bulgar that Ibn Fadlan, a member of a
diplomatic mission out of Baghdad, encountered Rus along the Volga
in 922. He observed their appearance closely:
I have never seen more perfect physical specimens, tall as date
palms, blond and ruddy. . . . Each man has an axe, a sword, and
a knife and keeps each by him at all times. . . . Every man is tattooed from finger nails to neck with dark green (or green or
blue-black) trees, figures, etc.
Each woman wears [above] either breast a box [brooch] of
iron, silver, copper, or gold; the value of the box indicates the
wealth of the husband. Each box has a ring from which depends
a knife. The women wear neck rings of gold and silver, one for
[ 56 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
each 10,000 dirhems, which her husband is worth; some

women have many. Their most prized ornaments are green glass
beads. . . . They string them for necklaces. . . .
Ibn Fadlan also had the opportunity to attend a Rus funeral. The
dead man was placed in a ship, which his followers then set on fire.
Through an interpreter, one of the Rus explained the reason for this:
You take the people who are most dear to you and whom you honor
most and you put them in the ground where insects and worms devour
them. We burn him in a moment, so that he enters Paradise at once.
The supply of Arabic silver appears to have dried up toward the end
of the tenth century, and so did most Rus trade with the Islamic world.
But there was at least one more great journey to the east. In 1036 a
twenty-five-year-old warrior named Ingvar set out from Sweden, leading a small fleet along the old route down the Dnieper and into the
Black Sea. From there Ingvar and his men seem to have followed
another river east to the Caspian Sea and sailed across it. Then, as far
as we can tell, they struck out overland, still heading eastward. We
dont know where exactly they were headingperhaps they were trying to find a route to China?
All we know for certain is that the expedition was a disaster in
which nearly everybody died. Some thirty stones set up in central Sweden in memory of Ingvars dead followers testify to this. But the stones
give us only hints of what happened out in Serkland (a Norse name
for the Islamic east). Later a saga was written about Ingvar the FarTraveled, a tale of fantastic adventures full of monsters and beautiful
princesses. But a memorial-stone inscription tells the true story of the
risks of a Vikings life: Tola had this stone set up in memory of her
son, Harald, the brother of Ingvar. With manly prowess they travelled
afar for gold. In the east they gave the eagle food [they killed men, leaving their bodies for scavengers]. They died south in Serkland.
[ trading
ARABS AND SCANDINAVIANS

IBN FADLAN HAS LEFT US ONE OF THE MOST DETAILED EYEWITNESS REPORTS
about Viking customs. He even observed a Rus merchant at prayer before a long upright
piece of wood that has a face like a mans and is surrounded by little figures. The man
bowed down before the carving and said, O my Lord, I have come from a far land,
named all the things he had brought to sell, then laid out offerings of bread, meat, onions,
and milk. He concluded with the appeal, I want you to send me a merchant who has
lots of . . . dirhems and will buy on my terms without being difficult. When business
went well, the merchant returned to the carving to give thanks. Then he takes a certain number of sheep or cattle and kills them. Part of the meat is given away to the poor.
The rest is thrown to the tall figure and the smaller figures standing around it.
Above: Rus warrior-merchants gather at a Slavic settlement along the Dnieper River.
Other Arab writers recorded additional intriguing observations. A geographer named

Ibn Rustah, writing about the same time as Ibn Fadlan, left this description of the Rus
in Kiev or Novgorod:
They fight with the Slavs and use ships to attack them; they take them captive
and . . . sell them as slaves. . . . They have no villages, estates or fields. Their
only occupation is trading in sable and squirrel and other kinds of skins, which
they sell to those who will buy from them. They take coins as payment and fasten them into their belts. They are clean in their clothing, and the men adorn
themselves with gold arm-rings. . . . They have many towns. They are generous
with their possessions, treat guests honourably, and act handsomely towards
strangers who take refuge with them, and all those who accept their hospitality.
Around 950 Ibrahim al-Tartushi, an Arab-Jewish merchant from Iberia, visited Scandinavia itself and had this to say about the town of Hedeby, Denmark:
They hold a feast where all meet to honour their deity and to eat and drink.
Each man who slaughters a sacrificial animalan ox, ram, goat, or pigfastens
it up on poles outside the door of his house to show that he has made his sacrifice in honour of the god. The town is poorly provided with property or treasure. The inhabitants principal food is fish, which is very plentiful. The people
often throw a newborn child into the sea rather than maintain it. Furthermore
women have the right to claim a divorce; they do this themselves whenever they
wish. There is also an artificial make-up for the eyes: when they use it beauty
never fades; on the contrary, it increases in men and women as well.
This goes to show how much opinion could color the reports of eyewitnesses. Although
you wouldnt guess it from al-Tartushis description, Hedeby was actually a very prosperous trading center. But al-Tartushi was from Crdoba, the most refined and sophisticated city in western Europe. We can take that into account as we read his comment
on music in Hedeby: I have never heard more horrible singing . . . it is like a growl
coming out of their throats, like the barking of dogs, only much more beastly.
HE LATE TENTH CENTURY WAS A TIME OF TRANSITION AND

upheaval for many in northern Europe. With Scandinavian kings
asserting more power, there was more competition for the throne and
more conflict between kings. The authority of local chiefs was eroding, so these men were seeking ways to maintain their wealth and influence. In Russia, too, rulers were increasing their control, greatly
reducing Swedish opportunities in the east. With the dwindling availability of Arab silver, and new sources of silver in Europe emerging,
trade patterns and the economy were also changing. As at the beginning of the Viking Age, there were many Scandinavians looking for
instant fame and fortune. Now Danes, Norwegians, and Swedes alike
turned their ambitionsand their longshipstoward England.
Opposite page:
A page from
the fourteenthcentury Icelandic
manuscript
Flateyjarbk,
which contains a
number of sagas,
including the
FROM RAIDERS TO RULERS
lives of NorweIn 980, Viking raids on England resumed with fierce intensity. Then in gian kings
such as Olaf
991 Olaf Tryggvason led ninety-three ships in plundering the south- Tryggvason.
61
Aethelred was
nicknamed Unraed,
Old English for
uncounseled or
badly advised,
but hes often been
called Aethelred
the Unready. This
portrait is taken
from one of the
coins he issued
during his reign.
east of England. The English king, Aethelred, seemed unable to muster

an adequate military response. Instead he resorted to bribery, as the
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle recorded: In this year it was first counselled that
tribute be yielded to the Danishmen, because of the horrors they
worked along the coasts. The first payment was ten thousand pounds.
Three years later Olaf was back, accompanied by King Svein
Forkbeard of Denmark and a fleet of ninety-four ships.
They first attacked London, then pillaged along the
southern coast until Aethelred and his counselors
decided once more to pay them to leave. The
tribute this time was a full winters provisions
and sixteen thousand pounds of silver. The
Anglo-Saxon Chronicles entry for the year
concludes, Olaf then promised him
[Aethelred]and also did as he promised
that he would never again come to the English people in enmity. He returned to
Norway with his loot, which helped him to
win the crown of Norway the next year.
Olafs agreement to leave England in peace
certainly didnt stop other Vikings. If anything, they
were even more tempted to seek their fortunes there,
since it was becoming ever more common for the English to
pay them to stop raiding. In 1002 Aethelred bought off the latest group
of raiders with the huge sum of 24,000 pounds. A few months later,
believing there was a Scandinavian plot against him, he ordered all
Danes in England killed. Although we dont know how thoroughly this
command was carried out, we do know that one of the dead was
Gunnhild, who had been captured along with her husband when he
was raiding in England the previous year. Gunnhild was the sister of
Svein Forkbeard.
[ 62 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
In revenge, Svein led a series of fierce raids in 1003 and 1004. Bands
of Vikings attacked England nearly every year following. Some of these
raids seem to have been very well-organized operations. Aethelred tried
to end them by paying the Danes ever larger amounts, peaking at
48,000 pounds in 1012. His efforts proved useless. In 1013 Svein himself returned to England at the head of his fleet. Aethelred fled
to Normandy, and Svein was acknowledged king of England. He died only two months later, and his men
named his son Cnut (or Canute) as his successor.
For two years Cnut battled Aethelred and
then his son, Edmund. When Edmund died in
1016, Cnut took the English throne without
resistance. Three years later he became king
of Denmark as well. In 1028 he gained much
of Norway and soon extended his influence
into Sweden. Cnuts empire was the largest
realm ever ruled by a Viking. It was also one
of the best governed, at least in England,
where Cnut lived most of the rest of his life.
Even though he had been an invader, he was
accepted as the countrys lawful king. He had
become a Christian in 1013, afterward pleasing the English people by making many donations to churches and
monasteries. Best of all, England was at peace throughout Cnuts reign. Cnut and his
queen, Emma of
Normandy, present
a gold cross to a
CHANGING WAYS
church in WinchesIn 1027 Cnut went to Rome to attend the coronation of the new Ger- ter, England.
man emperor. As a Christian and the ruler of a sea-spanning empire,

Cnut had become a full participant in mainstream European life. The
same thingalthough on a less grand scalewas happening to his fellow Scandinavians. The main reason was Christianity, which had been
[ the
end of an era 000000000000000000000000000 63 ]
TRADITIONAL NORSE RELIGION HONORED MANY DEITIES.

The three greatest gods were Odin, Thor, and Frey. Odin,
called the All-Father and the High One, was concerned
with war, poetry, and magic. His
wife, Frigg, was a goddess of
prophecy and the home. Thor,
armed with his mighty hammer,
protected humankind both on
land and sea. He was also the god of storms. Frey looked
after the rain and sunshine that were necessary for the
growth of crops. People called upon him, according to
Snorri Sturluson, for fruitful seasons and for peace.
His sister, Freyja, shared these qualities, and was also
a powerful goddess of love and magic.
Frey and Freyja were closely associated with
nature spirits called elves. Some elves were
thought of as guardians of particular farms and
families; Norse housewives commonly made offerings of food to them. Judging by the records that
have come down to us, the making of offerings was
one of the main forms of worship in the Viking
world. When meat was offered, the animal had to
be killed in a special way that dedicated it to the
gods (although worshippers, too, would share in
the meat). Snorri Sturluson wrote that Odin himself decreed three annual sacrificial feasts: there
should be a sacrifice at the beginning of winter for a successful year, and at midwinter for regeneration, and a third in summer which was a sacrifice for victory.
THE OLD
BELIEFS
Above: This bronze statue of Thor with his hammer was made around the year 1000
and is less than three inches tallsmall enough to be held in a worshippers hand.
the dominant religion of most of western

Europe for centuries and was in many ways
the heart of medieval European culture.
The church began to send missionaries to
Scandinavia during the 800s. Norse raiders,
traders, and settlers also encountered Christianity abroad. Through formal and informal
contacts, it made slow inroads, often peacefully coexisting with native beliefs. Sometimes
the new beliefs and the old coexisted within
one person. For example, a ninth-century
woman was buried in Hedeby, Denmark,
wearing both a Christian cross and a pendant
in the shape of a hammer, symbol of the god
Thor. The Book of Settlements tells us that an
Icelander known as Helgi the Skinny believed
in Christ, but prayed to Thor on sea-journeys
and in tough situations.
Many Norse converts sincerely embraced
Christianitys teachings. Many others seem to
have accepted it primarily for its usefulness.
Scandinavian merchants quickly learned that
adopting at least some aspects of Christianity was good for trade
Christians preferred to do business with other Christians. Scandinavian
kings found that the same was true in international relationsChristian rulers negotiated more favorable agreements (including marriages
between royal families) with other Christian rulers. Norse monarchs
also realized that the strong organization and power structure of the
church would support their authority and help them extend it.
Once a king became Christian, his subjects generally had to follow,
although conversion did not always happen willingly or peacefully. For
[ the
end of an era 000000000000000000000000000 65 ]
A Swedish rock
carving may portray a couple who
have embraced
Christianity,
symbolized by the
cross held by
the man.
instance, Olaf Haraldsson (later Saint Olaf), who ruled Norway from
1015 to 1030, ordered chieftains who did not accept Christianity to be
blinded or outlawed. To the common people Olaf offered the choice of
being baptized, exiled, or killed.
Different conditions prevailed in Iceland, where there had been Christians since the early years of settlement. Most were slaves or freedmen
and freedwomen from Ireland or Scotland. Some of the leading Norse
colonists had also embraced Christianity, among them Aud the DeepMinded. (The situation was similar in Greenland, where the first Christian settler was Erik the Reds wife, Thjodhild.) By the year 1000, however,
conflicts between Christians and non-Christians had reached a point
where many Icelanders felt something needed to be done. At the Althing
that year, both sides appealed to the lawspeaker, Thorgeir, for arbitration.
After meditating for a day and a night, Thorgeir said, It seems to
me good sense . . . that we should seek a middle course, so that we all
have one law and one custom; because if we divide the law, we will
divide the peace. Then, says an early Icelandic history, Thorgeir
declared the law, that all unbaptised people in the land should become
Christian and be baptised. The decision must have been a surprise,
since Thorgeir himself followed the old faith. But knowing how much
Icelands reliance on imports required close relations with other countries, most of which were Christian or becoming Christian, Thorgeirs
choice was one that made, as he said, good sense.
THE LAST OF THE VIKINGS
After Cnuts death in 1035, his empire collapsed, and England and
Scandinavia entered another period of turmoil. It was during this time
that King Olaf Haraldssons half-brother Harald served as a mercenary
in Russia and then in the Varangian Guard. In 1044 Harald returned to
Scandinavia (having married a Russian princess on his way back) and
began his two-year fight to take the throne of Norway. He dealt so
[ 66 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
harshly with the Norwegian chiefs who resisted his authority that he
was given the nickname Hardradi, hard ruler. He then set about conquering Denmark, but it took him twenty years of warfare with the
Danish king (Cnuts nephew), during which thousands of men died.
With Norway and Denmark under his power, Harald Hardradi felt
he had a claim on the rest of Cnuts empire and turned his sights on
England. In secret he prepared a fleet of three hundred ships. With each
ship probably carrying about thirty men, Haralds army numbered
around nine thousand. They landed in northern England in September 1066, and Harald quickly took the city of York.
The English king, Harold Godwinsson, had been in the south,
expecting an invasion by William, Duke of Normandy. When he heard
about Hardradis landing, he marched his army north. At noon on September 25 he surprised the Norwegian army outside York at Stamford
Bridge. King Haralds Saga described Hardradi watching the English
approach: And the closer the army came, the greater it grew, and their
glittering weapons sparkled like a field of broken ice.
The two kings met. Harald of Norway demanded land. Harold of England swore he would give him only enough to be buried in. The battle
began, and raged through the day, both sides fighting ferociously. Then,
according to the saga, Harald Hardradi fell into . . . a fury of battle:
He rushed forward ahead of his troops, hewing with both
hands. Neither helmet nor armour could withstand him, and
everyone in his path gave way before him. It looked then as if
the English were on the point of being routed. . . . But now King
Harald . . . was struck in the throat by an arrow, and that was
his death-wound.
The English won the day; so many of the invaders were killed that
only twenty-four ships were needed to take the survivors home to Nor[ the
end of an era 000000000000000000000000000 67 ]
In a scene from the way. But Harold Godwinssons troubles werent over. Only three days
Bayeux Tapestry,
William of Nor- after the death of Harald Hardradi, William of Normandy and his
mandys fleet nears 10,000-man army landed in southern England. Godwinsson once again
the English coast.
force-marched his men to battle. The two armies had their historic confrontation at Hastings on October 14, 1066. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle sums up the result: There king Harold was killed. . . . The French
held the field.
The Viking Age is said to have begun in England, with the raid on
Lindisfarne in 793. It can also be said to have ended in England, with
the events of 1066, which were both significant and symbolic. Harald
Hardradi, whose life was one of Viking adventure, was defeated by an
English king who was the grandson of a Danish Viking, who in turn
was defeated by a direct descendant of the Northman Rollo. But Rollos
great-great-grandson William was not regarded as a Northman or
Viking. He was French.
The Normans werent the only Scandinavian population who had
blended in with the people they settled among, adopting their language
[ 68 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
and customs. The same thing had happened in Russia. For that matter, it had happened in Englands Danelaw.
In Ireland, Viking power had been dwindling, although distinct
Scandinavian communities remained in the cities. Most of the Northmen were now Christians, though, and they hired themselves out as
mercenaries to feuding Irish kings far more often than they conducted
raids on their own behalf.
Raiders still sailed from the Norse settlements in the Scottish
islands, and sometimes even from Norway itself, into the thirteenth
century. But the great outpouring of Scandinavian warriors, merchants,
and colonists was over. By the second half of the twelfth century, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden were each united under a single ruler and
were fully involved in the culture and politics of western Europe. Looking to the future, the Scandinavian countries were well on their way
to becoming the nations we know today.
[ the
end of an era 000000000000000000000000000 69 ]
A Norman kills an
English soldier.
After the Battle of
Hastings, William
of Normandy
became King
William I of England, also known
as William the
Conqueror.
793 Viking raid on monastery at Lindisfarne in the English kingdom of

Northumbria
794 Viking raid on monastery at Jarrow, Northumbria
799 Viking raid in western Frankia
802, 806 Viking raids on
monastery at Iona
834 first of three Viking raids
on Dorestad, Frisia
836 twenty-five shiploads of Vikings attack the English kingdom of Wessex
841 Vikings establish a longphort at Dublin, Ireland
842 Vikings overwinter near the mouth of the Loire River in Frankia
844 a Viking fleet raids the Iberian cities of Lisbon, Cadiz, and Seville
845 100 Viking ships sail up the Seine River to Paris
850 Vikings overwinter on an island in southeastern England
mid-800s Swedish warriors and merchants known as Rus dominate Kiev
and Novgorod
859862 Bjorn Ironside and Hastein lead a Viking expedition into the
Mediterranean
860 approximate date of first Rus raid on Constantinople
860s settlement of Iceland begins
866 the Great Army, made up mostly of Danes, invades England
867 the Great Army captures the city of York, capital of Northumbria
876 Danish commander Halfdan distributes Northumbrian farmland to his men
886 Alfred the Great cedes English lands known as the Danelaw to Vikings
902 Alfreds son Edward begins conquest of Danelaw; Norwegian Vikings
driven out of Dublin
907 Rus raid on Constantinople
911 Frankish king gives lands to Viking leader Rollo
914 a Viking army conquers Brittany
915 Vikings return to Dublin
917 Edward and his sister Aethelflaed bring most of Danelaw under English rule
KEY DATES IN
VIKING HISTORY
922 Arab diplomat Ibn Fadlan meets Rus along the Volga River
930 Icelanders establish a national assembly, the Althing
939 the Bretons drive the Vikings out of Brittany
941, 944 Rus raids on Constantinople
954 the last Viking king of York, Erik Bloodaxe,
is killed in battle
986 Erik the Red leads the settlement of
Greenland; Bjarni Herjolfsson sights
North America
991 Olaf Tryggvason leads 93 ships in plundering
the southeast of England
994 Olaf Tryggvason and Danish king Svein Forkbeard
A hoard of
attack London
coins and
995 Olaf Tryggvason becomes king of Norway
jewelry from
mid-ninth1000 Leif Eriksson leads first Scandinavian exploration of North America;
century
Iceland chooses Christianity as its official religion
Birka,
Sweden
1002 king of England pays huge tribute to Vikings, then orders all Danes in
England killed
1013 Svein Forkbeard conquers England, dies, and is succeeded by his son
Cnut; Cnut becomes a Christian
1015 Olaf Haraldsson becomes king of Norway and begins to force his
subjects to convert to Christianity
1019 Cnut becomes king of Denmark as well as England
1028 Cnut adds much of Norway to his realm
1035 death of Cnut
1036 Ingvar leads expedition from Sweden to somewhere east of the Caspian Sea
1046 Harald Hardradi becomes king of Norway, begins conquest of Denmark
1066 Harald Hardradi invades England, is defeated at the Battle of Stamford
Bridge on September 25; William of Normandy invades England, defeats
the English at the Battle of Hastings on October 14
GLOSSARY
Althing The national assembly of Iceland during the Viking Age.

After Iceland came under Norwegian and then Danish rule (in
1262 and 1380) the Althing became a court of law, till 1800. It
was restored as the nations parliament when Iceland regained its
independence in 1944.
Britain The island now occupied by the nations of England, Wales,
and Scotland. At the beginning of the Viking Age there were four
English kingdoms (Wessex in the south, Mercia in the center, East
Anglia in the east, and Northumbria in the north) and two main
Welsh kingdoms (Gwynedd in the north and Dyfed in the south).
What is now Scotland included the Welsh-speaking kingdom of
Strathclyde in the southeast, north of that the Irish-speaking
kingdom of Dalrada, and north of that the ancient kingdom of
the Picts.
Byzantine Empire The Greek-speaking eastern half of the Roman
Empire, with its capital at Constantinople. During most of the
Viking Age it was comprised mainly of what are now Greece and
Turkey.
deciduous Refers to trees that lose their leaves in the fall.
dirhem A silver coin; the basic unit of currency in the medieval
Muslim world.
fjord A narrow waterway where the sea flows inland between cliffs
or mountains.
heathen and pagan Terms used to describe followers of traditional,
pre-Christian religions and their beliefs and practices.
high seat A central bench in a Norse house, reserved for the houses
owner; it might be framed by carved wooden pillars, which also
helped support the roof.
[ 72 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
Iberia The peninsula occupied by modern Spain and Portugal. During the Viking Age most of Iberia was under Arab rule and was
known as al-Andalus.
longphort An Irish word for a fortified landing place for Viking ships.
marten A large weasel-like animal with thick, dark fur.
Middle Ages The period of European history from about 500 to
about 1500.
Norse The name scholars generally prefer to use for Viking Age
Scandinavians when they were not taking part in Viking expeditions.
Saami People of arctic and subarctic Norway, Sweden, Finland,
and Russia, who traditionally made much of their living as
reindeer herders and hunters. They have also been known as
Lapps or Laplanders.
saga A long story in prose written down in medieval Scandinavia or
Iceland. Some sagas related myths and legends, but many were
histories, telling of important events and of Vikings, settlers,
explorers, kings, poets, and other notable people.
Slavic Refers to Slavic languages and to the peoples of central and
eastern Europe who speak them. The Slavic languages spoken
during the Viking Age included early forms of Polish, Russian,
Ukrainian, and Bulgarian.
taiga Subarctic forest land, where the main plants are coniferous
treescone-bearing evergreens such as pine, spruce, and fir.
tundra Land where the soil is permanently frozen below the surface, allowing only short-lived grasses and similar plants to grow
during the brief summer.
Viking Age A common name for the period during which Scandinavian raiders were most active in the British Isles and continental
Europe, usually dated from 793 to 1066.
[ glossary 000000000000000000000000000000000 73 ]
FOR MORE INFORMATION
BOOKS
Berger, Melvin, and Gilda Berger. The Real Vikings: Craftsmen,
Traders, and Fearsome Raiders. Washington, DC: National Geographic, 2003.
Gallagher, Jim. The Viking Explorers. Philadelphia: Chelsea House,
2001.
Grant, Neil. The Vikings. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998.
Gravett, Christopher. Going to War in Viking Times. Danbury, CT:
Franklin Watts, 2001.
Hinds, Kathryn. Cultures of the Past: The Vikings. New York: Benchmark Books, 1998.
Lassieur, Allison. The Vikings. San Diego, CA: Lucent Books, 2001.
Philip, Neil. Odins Family: Myths of the Vikings. New York: Orchard
Books, 1996.
Rees, Rosemary. The Vikings. Chicago, IL: Heinemann Library, 2002.
Schomp, Virginia. Myths of the World: The Norsemen. New York: Marshall Cavendish Benchmark, 2008.
Schomp, Virginia. The Vikings. New York: Scholastic, 2005.
WEB SITES
BBC. Ancient History: Vikings.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/vikings/
Jorvik Viking Centre. Vikings.
http://www.jorvik-viking-centre.co.uk/vikings1.htm
National Museum of Natural History. Vikings: The North Atlantic Saga.
http://www.mnh.si.edu/vikings/start.html
NOVA Online. The Vikings.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/vikings/
[ 74 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
Parks Canada. LAnse aux Meadows National Historic Site.

http://www.pc.gc.ca/lhn-nhs/nl/meadows/index_e.asp
Viking Ship Museum. The Sea Stallion from Glendalough:
The Longship-Past and Present.
http://www.vikingeskibsmuseet.dk/index.php?id=647&L=1
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
Almgren, Bertil, ed. The Viking. New York: Crescent Books, 1978.
Chartrand, R., et al. The Vikings: Voyagers of Discovery and Plunder.
New York: Osprey, 2006.
Fitzhugh, William W., and Elisabeth I. Ward, eds. Vikings: The North
Atlantic Saga. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2000.
Fletcher, Richard. The Barbarian Conversion: From Paganism to Christianity. New York: Henry Holt, 1997.
Graham-Campbell, James, ed. Cultural Atlas of the Viking World. New
York: Facts on File, 1994.
Haywood, John. Encyclopaedia of the Viking Age. New York: Thames
and Hudson, 2000.
Kennedy, Hugh. Mongols, Huns, and Vikings: Nomads at War. London:
Cassell, 2002.
Magnusson, Magnus. Vikings! New York: E. P. Dutton, 1980.
Marsden, John. The Fury of the Northmen: Saints, Shrines and SeaRaiders in the Viking Age, AD 793878. New York: St. Martins
Press, 1993.
McCullough, David Willis, ed. Chronicles of the Barbarians: Firsthand
Accounts of Pillage and Conquest, From the Ancient World to the
Fall of Constantinople. New York: Times Books, 1998.
Savage, Anne, trans. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles. New York: St. Martins Press, 1983.
[
selected bibliography 000000000000000000000000 75 ]
Sawyer, Peter, ed. The Oxford Illustrated History of the Vikings. New
York: Oxford University Press, 1997.
SOURCES FOR QUOTATIONS
Chapter 1
p. 9 Dire portents: Graham-Campbell, Cultural Atlas of the Viking
World, p. 122.
p. 10 The pagans: Marsden, The Fury of the Northmen, p. 42.
p. 10 never before: Magnusson, Vikings!, p. 34.
p. 14 That tribute consists: Fitzhugh, Vikings, p. 49.
p. 21 King Olaf: Kennedy, Mongols, Huns and Vikings, pp. 182183.
Chapter 2
p. 23 he had more: Chartrand, The Vikings, pp. 1516.
p. 24 the pagans first: Marsden, The Fury of the Northmen, p. 68.
p. 25 Bitter is the wind: Magnusson, Vikings!, p. 152.
p. 25 one of their leaders: Marsden, The Fury of the Northmen, p. 56.
p. 26 The Danes attacked: Sawyer, The Oxford Illustrated History of
the Vikings, p. 23.
p. 26 heathen men and fought with: Savage, The Anglo-Saxon
Chronicles, p. 83.
p. 27 the Northmen with a hundred: McCullough, Chronicles of the
Barbarians, p. 215.
p. 27 coming to the ocean: ibid., p. 216.
p. 28 Pagans still: Sawyer, The Oxford Illustrated History of the
Vikings, p. 88.
p. 28 After they had been: ibid., p. 88.
p. 29 It is related and One summer Harald: Graham-Campbell,
Cultural Atlas of the Viking World, p. 151.
[ 76 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
p. 30 a great heathen force: Savage, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, p. 92.

p. 31 they were ploughing: ibid., p. 96.
p. 33 The number of ships: Graham-Campbell, Cultural Atlas of the
Viking World, p. 142.
Chapter 3
p. 35 He said that the land: Fitzhugh, Vikings, p. 31.
p. 35 set of small islands: ibid., p. 154.
p. 36 in the days: Graham-Campbell, Cultural Atlas of the Viking
World, p. 166.
p. 37 The fjord teemed: Magnusson, Vikings!, p. 188.
p. 37 butter dripped: ibid., p. 188.
p. 38 quotations in the story of Aud the Deep-minded from The Book
of the Settlement of Iceland, translated by T. Ellwood, London, 1898.
Online at http://www.northvegr.org/lore/landnamabok/011.php
p. 40 Fourteen reached it: Sawyer, The Oxford Illustrated History of
the Vikings, p. 118.
p. 41 Wise men say: ibid., p. 115.
p. 43 There was great discussion: Fitzhugh, Vikings, p. 219.
p. 44 hired himself: ibid., p. 221.
p. 45 taking with them: ibid., p. 221.
p. 45 Discussion soon began: ibid., p. 221.
p. 46 There was now much talk: ibid., pp. 219220.
Chapter 4
p. 49 The Danish pirates: McCullough, Chronicles of the Barbarians,
p. 217.
p. 51 There arose strife: Magnusson, Vikings!, pp. 110111.
p. 52 set himself up: ibid., p. 116.
p. 55 They regard loyalty: Chartrand, The Vikings, p. 56.
p. 56 I have never seen: McCullough, Chronicles of the Barbarians, p. 223.
p. 57 You take the people: ibid., p. 228.
sources for quotations 00000000000000000000000 77 ]
p. 57 Tola had this stone: Almgren, The Viking, p. 150.

p. 58 a long upright and O my Lord: McCullough, Chronicles of
the Barbarians, p. 224.
p. 58 I want and Then he takes: Almgren, The Viking, p. 139.
p. 59 They fight with the Slavs: Magnusson, Vikings!, p. 117.
p. 59 They hold a feast: Almgren, The Viking, p. 59.
p. 59 I have never heard: Magnusson, Vikings!, p. 68.
Chapter 5
p. 62 In this year: Savage, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, p. 144.
p. 62 Olaf then promised: ibid., p. 145.
p. 64 for fruitful seasons: Magnusson, Vikings!, p. 13.
p. 64 there should be: Graham-Campbell, Cultural Atlas of the
Viking World, p. 114.
p. 65 believed in Christ: ibid., p. 115.
p. 66 It seems to me and Thorgeir declared: Magnusson, Vikings!,
p. 203.
p. 67 And the closer: ibid., p. 310.
p. 67 fell into and He rushed forward: ibid., p. 310.
p. 68 There King Harold: Savage, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, p. 195.
INDEX
Page numbers for illustrations
are in boldface
Aetheired (English king), 62, 62, 63
Aethelfaed (queen of Mercia), 31
Alcuin (scholar), 10
Alfred the Great (English king), 30, 30,
31, 35
Althing (national assembly), 3940, 39
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, 910, 25, 26, 30,
31, 62, 68
Arabs, and Scandinavians, 5859, 58
Aud the Deep-Minded, 38, 38, 66

Baghdad, 5557
Bjorn Ironside (Viking explorer), 49
Book of Settlements, 38, 40, 65
books, rare, 9, 10, 60
Byzantine Empire, 53, 5455
Charlemagne (Frankish emperor),
2526, 26
Charles the Bald (king), 27
[ 78 0000000000000000000000000000000000 vikings ]
Christianity, 63, 63, 6566, 65

Cnut (English king), 63, 66
Constantinople (Great City), 5355, 54
craftsmen, Norse, 1617
Cuthbert, Saint, 9
Ibrahim al-Tartushi (merchant), 59

Iceland, 3640, 37, 38, 39, 66
Ingolf (Scandinavian explorer), 37, 39
Ingvar (Viking warrior), 57
Ireland, 2425, 28, 69
Danelaw, 31
Dicuil (monk), 3536
knorrs (cargo ships), 42
England, 26, 3031, 30, 33

Erik Bloodaxe (Viking king), 31
Erik the Red, 40, 40, 43, 44, 66
Ermentarius (monk), 33
farmers, Norse, 1415, 16
Floki Vilgerdarson (Scandinavian
explorer), 3637
Freydis (Viking heroine), 45
Gardar Svafarsson (Scandinavian
explorer), 36
gods, Norse, 64, 64, 65
Great Army, 3031, 30, 33
Greenleand, 40, 42, 66
Grim Kamban (early Norse settler), 36
language, Scandinavian, 11
Leif the Lucky, 4344, 4647, 46
longhouses, 16, 17, 44, 44, 45
monasteries, Vikings raids of, 910,
2425
monks, 9, 10
Naddod (Scandinavian explorer), 36
Normans, 18, 6869, 68, 69
Olaf Haraldsson (king of Norway), 66
Olaf, Saint, 66
Olaf Tryggvason (Viking warrior), 6162
Oleg of Kiev (Slavic king), 52, 54
Ottar (merchant), 14, 35
pirates, 24, 29, 29
Harald Finehair (king of Norway), 29,

29, 36
Harald Hardradi (king of Norway),
6668
Harold Godwinsson (Harold of England), 6768
Hastein (Viking explorer), 49
Herjolfsson, Bjarni (merchant), 43
Hjorlief (Scandinavian explorer), 37, 39
homes, Norse, 16, 17
hunting and fishing, 1516, 16
Ibn Fadlan (diplomat), 57, 58, 59
Ibn Rustah (writer), 59
[
reindeer, 11, 11
religion
Christianity, 63, 63, 6566, 65
traditional Norse religion, 64, 64
Rognvald (ruler of Dublin), 31
Rollo (Viking leader), 33, 33, 68
Rurik (Slavic king), 52, 52, 56
Rus (warrior-merchants), 5057, 51
Russia, 5053, 50, 51, 52
Saami people, 11, 11, 14
Scandinavia, 10, 11, 1417, 15, 16, 17
sea and waterways, Scandinavian, 1718
index 000000000000000000000000000000000000 79 ]
ships, Viking
knorrs, 42
longphorts, 28
sailing times and guidelines, 41, 41
shipbuilding, 1820, 18, 19, 21, 21
slavery, 27, 39, 66
Snorri Sturluson (historian), 21, 64
society, Norse, 17
Svein Asleifsson (landowner), 23, 29
Svein Forkbeard (king of Denmark),
6263
Thorfinn Karlsefni (merchant), 4445
Thorgeir (lawspeaker), 66
tributes, paying, 14
Varangian Guard, 54, 55, 66
Viking Age, 1720, 18, 19, 28, 40

Vikings
arrival of, 8, 910
end of the Viking Age, 6163, 62,
6569, 65, 68, 69
Great Army, 3031, 30, 33
key dates in Viking history, 7071
raiders, 22, 2329, 24, 26, 27, 29,
6163
trading and raiding in the East, 48,
4959, 50, 51, 52, 54, 56, 58
Viking territory, 1213
western seas exploration, 34, 3545,
37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 43
William of Normandy, 68, 68, 69
women, Viking, 16, 32, 32, 45
KATHRYN HINDS grew up near Rochester, New York. She studied

music and writing at Barnard College, and went on to do graduate work
in comparative literature and medieval studies at the City University of New York. She has written more than forty books
for young people, including Everyday Life in Medieval Europe
and the books in the series LIFE IN THE MEDIEVAL MUSLIM
WORLD, LIFE IN ELIZABETHAN ENGLAND, LIFE IN ANCIENT
EGYPT, LIFE IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE, and LIFE IN THE RENAISSANCE. Kathryn lives in the north Georgia mountains with her
husband, their son, and an assortment of cats and dogs. When she is
not reading or writing, she enjoys dancing, gardening, knitting, playing music, and taking walks in the woods. Visit Kathryn online at
www.kathrynhinds.com
Fox Gradin / Celestial Studios Photography
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In memory of my grandfathers, Frederick Fernquist and Donald Lupton

THE AUTHOR AND PUBLISHER SPECIALLY WISH TO THANK O REN FALK,

who were the barbarians?

Introducing the Vikings

Fighting for Loot and Land

Exploring in the West

Trading and Raiding in the East

The End of an Era

key dates in viking history

for more information

sources for quotations

THE WORD BARBARIAN WAS COINED BY THE ANCIENT GREEKS

The barbarians, of course, did not think of themselves this

FF THE COAST OF THE MEDIEVAL ENGLISH KINGDOM OF

of lightning, and fiery dragons were

Another early chronicle identified the

introducing the vikings 00000000000000000000000 11 ]

LANSE AUX MEADOWS

Scholars have only recently begun to study interactions between

Farm families made up the majority of the population in the Middle

introducing the vikings 00000000000000000000000 15 ]

Walrus were difficult to hunt but

introducing the vikings 00000000000000000000000 17 ]

A scene from the

only way of linking together

Scandinavian products as amber,

introducing the vikings 00000000000000000000000 19 ]

WRITING AROUND 1220 , ICELANDIC

King Olaf . . . had a great vessel

MEDIEVAL SAGA, OR TALE, ABOUT NORSE SETTLERS IN THE

themselves with the land and its tasks, and

This painting from

A year after the raid on Lindisfarne, Vikings

seem to have lived in a state of constant fear, or at least vigilance. This

Vikings made a raid in western Frankia in 799, but the Frankish

fighting for loot and land 00000000000000000000 25 ]

lished a coastguard, ordered forts built

fighting for loot and land 00000000000000000000 27 ]

The Viking attack

fighting for loot and land 00000000000000000000 31 ]

Many members of the Great Army had chosen not

fighting for loot and land 00000000000000000000 33 ]

Rollo, shown here

TTAR, THE MERCHANT WE MET ON PAGE 14, VISITED THE

The discovery and settlement of Iceland were recorded in histories and

sailed on. Then he let loose the third

exploring in the west 000000000000000000000000 37 ]

Iceland had plenty

ONE OF ICELANDS MOST PROMINENT SETTLERS WAS AUD THE DEEP-MINDED,

Upon arrival, Hjorleif immediately chose a site on the southern

exploring in the west 000000000000000000000000 39 ]

A meeting of Icelands Althing, with

ing, peddlers and merchants selling

Erik the Red aboard

Around 980 a hot-tempered settler

NORSE SAILORS DID NOT HAVE COMPASSES OR OTHER SOPHISTICATED INSTRUMENTS TO

more than other Scandinavian colonists in the North

In 986 an off-course Icelandic merchant named

exploring in the west 000000000000000000000000 43 ]

This twelfthcentury chess

At first Gudrid and Thorfinns party traded

exploring in the west 000000000000000000000000 45 ]

GREENLANDERS SAGA, PRESERVED IN A SINGLE FOURTEENTH-CENTURY MANUSCRIPT,

N 859 TWO VIKINGS NAMED BJORN IRONSIDE AND HASTEIN LED